


I'd Be Your Memory

by jumbled-nonsense (notsodarling)



Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, High School, M/M, Two Idiot Boys In Love That Just Need To Talk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-02
Updated: 2019-08-02
Packaged: 2020-07-29 16:30:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20085292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notsodarling/pseuds/jumbled-nonsense
Summary: Michael takes Alex to one of his favorite spots in Roswell.





	I'd Be Your Memory

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this waaaay back in February or March and it just sat in a folder until I posted it on my tumblr ([here](https://jumbled-nonsense.tumblr.com/post/185348915653)) in June, and now I'm finally getting around to uploading it here.
> 
> Title from Memory by Sugarcult
> 
> Enjoy! <3

They’re parked at the lookout, a blanket spread out in the bed of Michael’s truck. Alex is laying down, his head propped up by his rolled up jacket, Michael quietly strumming along on the guitar. It’s still light out - sunset isn’t for another hour or so - but Alex wonders if this is what it should feel like. If this is what being good, and caring about someone, and having them care about you in return is maybe supposed to feel like.

Sometimes it feels too good to be true.

When Michael stops playing, but doesn’t move from where he’s sitting, his feet hanging over the edge of the bed, Alex wonders what’s going on inside his head. He knows from what Michael has told him that it’s noisy, it’s chaos, like his mind is moving a million miles an hour and he’s just trying to keep up. Sitting, spending time together, just listening to Michael play, sometimes joining in, gives Alex his own sense of peace, an escape almost from remembering the shit going on in his own life.

“Why do you like this spot so much?” Alex asks after a moment.

Michael doesn’t move, doesn’t look over at him, but Alex doesn’t need him to.

“I wanted to try and make something mine,” comes the reply and it is nothing like what Alex was expecting. “I was bounced around so much, never had a home growing up. Still don’t.”

Alex’s heart feels heavy at Michael’s words. He’s known for a while that Michael was preferring to live out of his truck instead of dealing with the shit going on at whatever foster home the system had currently shuffled him into. And even with his own abysmal home situation, at least he had somewhere to go. For every bit his father hated him, Jesse Manes never kicked his own son out of the house. Though Alex knew that had more to do with the man protecting his own pride and reputation than actually caring about his son.

Alex wonders if maybe he could be that for Michael. He wonders what it would be like, to put that faith in another person, and maybe not be disappointed for once. Sometimes Alex doesn’t know why he keeps trying, why he can’t help but be kind and help people, like people, try and see the good that exists in them. His father always says he’s too much like his mother, and Alex knows he looks like her, reminds his father too much of her. But he also knows that shouldn’t matter, he shouldn’t hate Alex for his genetics, he shouldn’t hate Alex for being gay - a good parent would love their kid no matter what.

The words stay on the tip of Alex’s tongue, no matter how much he wants to speak them into existence.

“I got into UNM,” Michael finally says, setting the guitar down and turning to look at Alex. “Full ride.”

Alex can’t be the reason Michael stays. So he nods, because this is what happens. You care for someone, you open up to someone, and it never turns out how you want. He can’t be the reason Michael stays in Roswell, he needs Michael to be better, do better. He needs to see Michael go out into the world and show it that no matter how hard it beat him down, no matter how hard it tried to keep him down, he could still rise up and prove it wrong.


End file.
